Previously on ‘Awkward.’ Jenna had finally made her decision. She tried a do-over, and much to her chagrin, imagining things on a different wavelength didn’t do much to make it better. This week, she finally makes her big choice – the one we’ve been waiting for all season. Will her beau be the handsome Matty McKibben? Or the super sweet Jake Rosati?

“The Other Shoe” is an effective and entertaining finale, offering a quick resolution to the relationship drama and transitioning into a new situation that offers more material for the show’s other characters. It captures the depth in the show’s ensemble, bringing supporting characters back into focus and using the oncoming summer vacation as a rally point for a collection of storylines featured during the season. While it lacks the same emotional gutpunch of last season’s finale, it nonetheless serves as an engaging and solid conclusion to the season.

After Jake’s turn for the worse in recent episodes, there wasn’t really any coming back from that for me. Granted in all honestly I think I’ve been leaning towards Matty for a while now no matter how much of a good guy Jake was. But he can step aside because now Matty is already doing more to make Jenna feel appreciated: He’s not embarrassed to show his feelings towards her in public, he DTRed without her having to bring it up, and he even asked before taking a bite out of her sandwich. Best boyfriend ever! Mostly for that last reason really. Had he not asked I would have reached through the TV screen and punched him, and it’s not even my food.

Just when we thought we just about had Lacey figured out, and that Kevin was her Matty, we learned that things aren’t so black and white. In many ways Kevin isn’t solely Matty, but more likely a mix of the two. However, Jenna’s decisions now have another shoe involved: Tamara.

Hurts Like A Mother

Rafa and Divya have been making sweet love and as odd as it seems to Royal Pains fans, the medical assistant has thrown caution to the wind.When the Rafa character was introduced weeks ago, he was starring in the polo matches that weren’t expected to stretch past one episode. We got a big surprise when Divya and Rafa became an item at the conclusion of that show.

He has stuck around to serve as the romantic partner Divya never knew she wanted. In a video clip of tonight’s show, she tells Dr. Hank Lawson that she couldn’t be more surprised to be with a man like Rafa.

What I liked most was that Paige seemed to bond and connect with Fiona not only as a fellow college freshman, but also as someone who felt like they were on the outside looking in. Seeing Paige connect with her and care for her like she did was refreshing. I would have loved for someone to have supported and taken care of my academic life in the same situation; it was almost like something a big sister would do, and I loved seeing Paige fill that role.

Similarly, I enjoyed watching that relationship inform and transform Paige’s perspective on her parents. She finally came around to a conclusion that they may not have made her, but they made her who she is as an individual now, which is the most important thing.

On the Evan and Paige front, the couple is expected to continue to manage their emotions as best they can about the sudden changes in their lives.

31st Century Fox

Futurama has a history of great anthology shows that deal out daring stories. Still, the last episode of the season leaps nimbly over that bar and lands with its hands, flippers, and fins triumphantly in the air. Futurama goes absolutely friggin’ nuts over nature documentaries and it’s grim and great.

In “31st Century Fox,” the plot kicks off with the Planet Express staff asking for new uniforms after Mothzilla attacked their closet in Tokyo. Apparently, the Professor promised them new ones a year ago and never delivered on it, so they head to ‘Nvasions ‘N Such Space Uniforms in the Garment District. I know I bring this up a lot in my reviews, but the clever signs are my favorite part of the Futurama humor.

The initial visit to the Garment District provided a few humorous sight gags towards the beginning of the episode, particularly when the Planet Express crew were trying on different uniforms. It seemed like kind of an odd way for Bender to stumble into the fox hunting getup, but I suppose it’s not all that unreasonable for the Futurama ‘verse.

Each segment was made as if it were part of a nature documentary being narrated by Phil LaMarr. It begins with salmon and then continues to the Pinta Island Tortoise and The Elephant Seal, and while clearly best watched (and perhaps written…) while incredibly high, they manage to succeed regardless of what state you’re in. It’s really just three amusing vignettes seemingly made on a lark, and the entire affair seems almost like an idea rather than a full-fledged episode. Still, some of jokes are pretty great and it’s pleasant to see the show go somewhere new, even if it’s not really a direction anyone hoped for. Oddly, the first third of the show is probably the weakest, despite being written by the most veteran of its writers—the other two were written by first-time writers who’d been working as writers’ assistants—and are genuinely pretty great.

Lady Killer

“Pretty Little Liars” aired the mid-season finale for its third season Tuesday night on ABC Family, channel 38 in Queens, and fans finally got answers to who killed Maya and who’s on the “A” team in episode 12, “The Lady Killer.”

The Maya murder trial is officially underway and all of Rosewood is abuzz. The liars call Emily over under the guise of apologizing for thinking Paige is A but they really just want to tell her that they think Paige is A. Oh, and that they found the earring Aria buried with Alison in her bag. Well, Emily doesn’t want to have any of it and storms out. I bet no one, except for everyone, saw that coming.

When Emily doesn’t show up to school, Hanna puts two and two together when she tells Aria and Spencer that Paige wasn’t at school either. Since the Liars know that Emily doesn’t want to see them, they’ve sent Caleb as a spy to watch over Emily. Caleb assures the Liars that Emily is safe with the reporters outside her house.

She leaves promptly, after saying, “Three to one. A wins.” The girls realize that this is what A, or Paige, wants – to separate Emily from the girls and have her all to herself. Garrett’s trial is underway. Mona, dressed as a nurse, flashes her ID card to the receptionist as she walks out of Radley Sanitarium, also holding some keys.

So it was a massive disappointment that this finale focused not on solving the mystery of the A Team, but on solving the mystery of who killed Emily’s girlfriend Maya. Turns out that it wasn’t Emily’s new girlfriend, whom the Liars decided was the killer last week, but the obviously suspicious new guy in town who claimed to be Maya’s cousin out of nowhere! Just when we thought the show would zig, it… well, zigged.

Save Yourself

HBO’s hit vampire drama “True Blood” was nothing but crazy if you’ve watched the season five finale of the show, titled “Save Yourself”. Save yourself, indeed! If you have yet to watch Sunday’s episode of the show, turn back now as this post contains nothing but spoilers as we round up the fifth season. If you’ve missed the show, you can read our full and detailed recap here.

Last week’s ‘True Blood’ episode “Sunset” saw Bill dispatching Jessica to turn Jason Stackhouse into a vampire under the new regime, while Sookie rallied the other Faeries into fighting back against Russell Edgington. So, what will the latest episode of ‘True Blood’ bring?

Let’s start with the first death, which coincidentally is also the show’s biggest loss – Russell Edgington has finally been put down. And despite Eric’s episode-wide amazing timing, it seems to have been the Faeries wot done it. Given that the Faeries have done frick-all for the entire season – barring procreating with the nearest drunk – the final score is Russell Nil, Faeries One. Which seems a tad unfair, no? And while it had to happen, and while it was glorious that Eric was present, and possibly partly responsible, it is a massive shame that the batshit ex-King will no longer be gracing Bon Temps with his psychotic presence. RIP Russell, you will be sorely missed.

And when it looked like we would finally get a bit of that old Russell we love so much, he gets staked in the lamest of ways. It’s absolutely fitting that Eric is the one to kill him, but it deserved a moment we would never forget, not a random killing before the opening credits. This also brings up another peccadillo- why are vampires, particularly ancient and powerful ones, so damn easy to kill? After this season they seem more fragile than your average human. What’s the benefit of longevity when you’re able to be dispatched as easy as a baby vamp fresh from the ground?

Donnie or Marie

In “Donnie or Marie” the show whittles the suspect pool down to two candidates: Richmond’s campaign manager Jamie Wright, and Richmond’s campaign adviser/ex-mistress, Gwen Eaton. It’s a “final two” scenario set up by last week’s closing shot, focusing on Gwen and Jamie, unnoticed amidst the crowd of onlookers following Richmond’s campaign speech.

How Linden and Holder do detective work throughout this episode is, they sit around in their car and make up wild theories and then act as if their wild theories are correct, and eventually — because the show is like this — they turn out to be correct. So they get Roberta to admit that Chief Nicole is an abusive lover and breaker-of-bones, and eventually twist her around into giving them this elevator footage that supposedly didn’t exist, which shows who the person is. (Also, it sounds like Roberta wasn’t the one that put up the haunted-tree picture, but whatever. I have a theory about that.*)

Although, technically, I’m not sure why it can’t just be considered the penultimate episode leading into the “real” finale that airs next week, but “Donnie or Marie” pushed viewers towards two possible killers. And, no, the Osmond pair did not special guest star and sing out who the killer was.

Are they the killers, or simply involved, and someone else is in on it. Michael Ames certainly seems to be important again, forgotten for much of the show’s run (he’s been in four episodes before tonight), but important enough to become a major anchor to the whole murder-a-teenage-girl conspiracy… but again, the important conversations that could reveal any tidbits about this happen off-screen or transferred via mind powers between characters in the many long scenes of people just staring at each other, or the conversations we only get one end of.

Commissions and Fees

Don was wrong. About a third of the way into “Commissions and Fees” Don tells Lane that he’ll get over getting quietly sacked from Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce over the “13-day loan” he finagled for himself. “The next thing will be better because it always is,” Don tells Lane, distraught after realizing that Don isn’t going to change his mind about forcing his resignation. “I’ve started over a lot, Lane. This is the worst part.”

In private, Don gives Lane the chance to confess, then he demands his resignation. Lane promises to make good on the money by Easter and maybe pull his son Nigel out of school. He fears losing his visa, and the shame of returning to England a failure. All desperation is lost on Don, who gives him the weekend to think of an “elegant exit” plan to tell the partners. Don confides in Megan about it.

Don will blame himself, you can already see that. He has shame and remorse all over his face when he hears the news. Last week, Joan touched him kindly and said, “You’re a good one.” It’s likely he married Megan because she believed he was good, but it’s the one thing he never believes of himself. He often does terrible things, but Megan was right in Tomorrowland, he always tries to do better.

Better Angels

Last night was the penultimate episode of The Walking Dead for the season, and you had to think AMC had some surprises in store for us. Especially since they killed off a major character at the end of last week’s episode. You had to know Better Angels was going to up the ante. Of course, I assumed that it would set the table for a big showdown in the season finale, but I was dead wrong there. But we’ll get to that in a bit.

“The Walking Dead” season 1 only had six episodes to accommodate everyone’s schedule and get it on air by Halloween of 2010. As a result, it felt less like a season of TV than a rough sketch of a series, introducing lots of characters and ideas and then going away before it could build any real forward momentum. Season 2 had a more traditional 13 episodes, and has had a more traditional cable season structure as a result. I don’t think it’s been successful at a lot of what it’s tried to do in terms of deepening our understanding of the characters, but there have been a number of clear arcs, most prominently the rising tension between Rick and Shane, who not only have a major philosophical disagreement, but a mutually exclusive desire to be Lori’s man, Carl’s father, etc. And that tension reaches its inevitable conclusion this week as Rick kills Shane after recognizing that Shane really did want to murder him to claim Lori, Carl and the unborn baby as his own.

The thing is, THE WALKING DEAD has now killed two major characters in the space of two weeks, one week before the end of a season that was shaped (and a little marred) by behind the scenes turmoil. If the upcoming season finale sees more death (which seems inevitable), or if it chases this dwindling group of survivors from the farm, well, I don’t know that a seven month break will be enough to stop my head from spinning. In other words, and I’ll utilize another baseball analogy: sometimes when you swing a bat too hard, you miss the ball and the bat goes flying out of your hands and into the crowd. After tonight’s WALKING DEAD, I feel like I’ve just been hit by a flying bat and I’m really worried that I’m going to wince next time this show’s writers take a swing.

Chase

This Week… Chase (Jesse Spencer) takes on a patient, Moira (Julie Mond), who is a cloistered nun on the verge of making her life-changing vows, and through the treatment process, he and Moira form a unique connection that tests their faith and reason. But when Moira’s condition worsens and requires a risky surgery, Chase’s judgment is compromised…

The episode begins with possibly the most attractive shots of Jesse Spencer ever, which is saying something. If you don’t want to read gay-porno-sounding language, don’t read the next sentence: His body is sculpted and his chest hairs are man-scaped perfectly—although he spent a bit too much time getting that orange-y tan. Back to the story. Chase, on crutches, answers his door to find House, who tries to interest him in the case of a 45-year-old truck driver with unexplained recurrent seizures. Chase declines.

On the whole, “Chase” isn’t a very good episode. It’s the latest in the show’s occasional efforts to follow non-House characters around the hospital, and easily the least of the bunch, because unlike “Wilson” or “5 to 9,” “Chase” doesn’t really show us anything new. Spencer does the same solid work he’s always done, and it’s nice to see Chase getting some time in the spotlight. The problem is that that time fails to delve much into his character or his perspective beyond what we might have gotten from any other episode. Chase wants to believe in God, but doesn’t. He falls in love (or thinks he’s fallen in love) way too quickly. Oh, and there’s clearly some kind of complicated father/son, mentor/mentee relationship going on between him and House, but that’s basically true of every doctor that works with House. By now, it’s really just justification to allow House going on acting like a dick. He does it because he cares, don’t you know.